


Genius Comes Along in Storms of Fabled Foreign Tongues

by orphan_account



Category: Black Panther (2018), Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, BAMF Peter Parker, BAMF T'Challa (Marvel), BAMF Tony Stark, Like slooooooooow build, M/M, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective T'Challa (Marvel), Protective Tony Stark, Slow Build, Sweet T'Challa (Marvel), Tony Feels, Tony Has Issues, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, a frozen river deadass moves faster than these two trying to get together, already we got a lot going on lmao, also the song is a Panic! At The Disco lyric, but they will learn, but uh... yeah this is a universe, there's lots of worldbuilding, they are stubborn bois, vaguely inspired by The 100, you see it in the beginning and then its gone pretty quick lmao
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-17
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-06-28 15:06:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15709686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: “Are you… not curious about your soul mate?” T'Challa asks Tony, a little confused. Okoye goes from suspicious to shocked, giving Tony a once over in a new way. Like she’s regarding an equal, not a potential enemy. Tony notices the shift and relaxes marginally but he doesn’t look more interested in the conversation now.“Not particularly, no,” he responds.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, so this is going to be a Long Boi accidentally. I have a lot of work done already and Tony and T'Challa have barely talked. They're too stubborn. So prepare for a slooooooooow burn. Glacier pace. But I have many plans for a crap ton of character development so bear with me.
> 
> As noted in the tags this, in the beginning anyways, is loosely inspired by The 100 if anyone has seen the show. You can see the influence in the beginning but it goes away fairly fast tbh. Then it's all me melding the MCU to my world. And I know the title is a long ass bitch but I liked the Panic! At The Disco lyric so. Also I hate naming shit.
> 
> And most importantly, I have acquired a beta- slippin_into_darkness! We've both done a lot of work on this, but give some love to my fresh new editor, who has done a wonderful job with this thus far! Especially after putting up with my absurdly long emails lmao.

Tony makes his way up the mountain, picking his way gingerly through the harsh but familiar land. It’s not the first time he’s made this trip and it’s not going to be the last either. Ideally he’d like to visit more often but strategically that wouldn’t be a good decision- he needs their tech, but he’s not entirely fond of them figuring out what he’s building. As it is he sometimes finds them lingering in the woods attempting to gather information. They’re usually killed swiftly, but he knows there has been more than a few that have escaped. He doesn’t want them to come back with useful information so he hides most of his work and he’s gotten good at it. The camouflage ensures that it doesn’t draw unwanted attention from anyone else either so it works out.

When he gets to the doors a camera spins in his direction but does little else. There are weapons systems built into the underground bunker but he disabled them all forever ago. No one save for Rhodey is smart enough to bring them back online and Rhodey has a vested interest in Tony’s safety being a good friend of his. He made sure of that. And it helps that he genuinely does like Rhodey- he’s funny and his humor breaks up Tony’s generally bleak life.

The door to the old bunker opens and Tony steps in, going through the usual routine, carefully setting aside weapons, clothing, and everything else he carries on him. The radiation from the planet doesn’t exactly agree with everyone inside. “Stark, nice to see your pretty face again,” Rhodey’s voice says over the speakers in the room.

He smiles, shaking his head as he drops his scarf to the ground. Useful in case sand storms hit unexpectedly. “Yeah, yeah. You’re probably the only one,” he says. People here aren’t fond of him and he doesn’t blame them- he wouldn’t like someone who has near complete control over him either. But it’s not hard to hold a technological control over a group of people who aren’t good with electronics, especially when the only guy that is is on your side. And even if Rhodey flipped sides, and he won’t given that he hates Schmidt, he won’t be able to get past Tony’s defenses.

“Yeah, well people here don’t really understand your vision,” he says. That’s not really true- they understand fine and that’s why they don’t like him much. But they need him so they aren’t in a position to negotiate.

“Maybe not. So how’ve you been?” he asks, moving to the next chamber.

“Probably better than you. We lost the Mona Lisa for a couple days, everyone freaked out but it turned out some kids stole it for fun,” he says. A painting, supposedly famous but Tony has no clue what it looks like. Doesn’t really care either, painting has never been his strong suit, technology is. Sadly the world is shit so technology is a privilege- he’d been lucky to find what he did. Then he found this place and a lot more and made his plans.

“We lost half a field in an acid rain fall, but we found deer. Most of them were deformed but we found a couple that weren’t.” Their vegetarian diet is mostly because that’s safer than meat but animals are coming up less messed up now, probably less radiation in the atmosphere but they aren’t sure. Either way you get a lot more food off a deer than a berry bush and Pepper has been happy to experiment with taste.

“Yeah, worse than losing a painting. Sorry,” Rhodey says and it’s genuine. He moves into the final chamber and picks up the ugly white clothing he’s always handed when he comes here. It’s awful and unnatural but its not like his own clothing can be worn in here thanks to the radiation. The people in here are weak.

When he steps into the actual bunker Rhodey is there waiting with a grin, “its been awhile,” he says, “we were starting to think you died.”

Very real possibility but no. “I had some other problems,” he says evasively. Its not exactly true- he found another bunker in the area and it took awhile to figure out its exact location and then they raided it. Found a decent amount of tech too, solar panels that were still functioning with a little work. He’s been working on setting up an indoor garden to make food less susceptible to death in the shitty weather.

Rhodey reaches out, wrapping his arms around him and Tony allows it, mostly standing stiff because the action is foreign to him. “So, how come you’re back?” Rhodey asks. Because he really only comes here when he wants something and they all know it- another reason he’s generally disliked.

“Can’t I just visit?” he asks, raising an eyebrow even though they both know its true.

“Not really your style,” Rhodey points out and he’s right.

“I brought medicine,” he tells Rhodey and his eyes grow wide.

“ _Actual_ medicine?” he asks.

Tony nods, “it’s in my stuff, don’t know if it’s safe to bring in here, but yeah.” Stephen will probably be pretty pleased all things considered. Brilliant doctor but limited heavily by his resources or lack thereof. Not unlike Tony in a way.

“What do you want for it?” Rhodey asks and that’s the golden question. They have water purifiers here and he needs a few things from one. Medicine here is more important than water to people who have a potentially unlimited source of it. From his understanding it seems that they’ve tapped into an underwater spring that supplies the bunker. Tony isn’t as lucky.

“Schmidt’s about to find out,” Tony says and Rhodey knows what to do from there.

*

Natasha gives him a lazy grin when he returns, “well, you don’t look pissed so I’m assuming things went your way,” she says.

Things almost always go his way but he nods anyways. “Turns out I found antibiotics. I suspected but its not like I’m a doctor so what do I know? But we know its useful now and if we’re lucky Sam can reverse engineer what’s in it and we can make our own. Something to fight infection would be useful.” That probably kills people more than anything else on this shithole planet.

“And they were willing to make the trade?” Nat asks.

Hell no, Schmidt’s recently appointed second was on his ass in seconds and he made good points too, he’s a better leader than Schmidt by far, but Schmidt is still in charge. Tony got what he wanted regardless of what one Steve Rogers cared about. “Eventually,” he says and Natasha relaxes.

“Great, because I haven’t had water in two days and I’m almost willing to drink out of the river.” Tony wrinkles his nose because that’s disgusting. Not all the rivers are toxic, but the one they live closest to is and the next non-toxic river around is fifty miles to the west. Trekking out there for water is a long endeavor and it’s straining, hence wanting to purify water closer to home and now they have the means to do it.

“I’d rather you didn’t. I’d be out a commander and frankly you’re the best I think this city has ever seen,” he tells her honestly. Natasha, unlike most of the commanders and the soldiers, is not just a one trick pony. She’s good at basically everything you’d need to be good at out here- setting traps, spying, hand to hand combat, she’s good with all kinds of weapons. She’s an invaluable resource that he can’t afford to lose.

Natasha smiles a little at the comment, “thank you. But I think Pepper is the most valuable resource we’ve got,” she says. She’s biased of course, Pepper being her partner and all, but she’s not entirely wrong either. Thanks to Pepper’s experiments they know what is and isn’t okay to eat and they know how to make the food taste good. Tony remembers a time when everything tasted like shit and people occasionally died from eating the wrong berries but Pepper has all but eliminated food borne illness and she managed to figure out how to breed chickens. Nat might ensure an invasion will go badly for their opponents but Pepper makes sure they don’t starve to death.

He nods, “that’s true. Sam is probably next on that list if I’m honest.” A chemist is a good thing to have and Tony’s good at it, but Sam is better. Thanks to him they have working medicine, kind of. Primitive stuff mostly, but given their environment Sam’s work is no small feat.

“Actually I think that’s you. Sam’s useful, but he isn’t a good leader and he’s not willing to do what needs to be done. You’ve managed to keep us relatively safe for the last ten years in a way none of us even knew possible, and now we have electricity,” Natasha says. “Even everyone else around here thinks you’re better than the leaders they have,” she points out.

Sure, probably because he’s not nearly as brutal as Vankov or Killian. But neither of them are good at strategy and rely on brute force to keep control in a way he’s never needed to. His father, much as it pains him to admit it, had a natural charm and Tony inherited it. Its left him with an ability to talk people into things they wouldn’t normally agree to and it makes him appealing to a crowd. These days it makes him appealing enough that people from other surrounding settlements will come to him sometimes seeking refuge, which he’ll give if they can give him useful information. It’s a simple trade and it’s served him well. Killian once told him it was a good way to get spies in his city but he’s had yet to find one that made it past the gates.

Desperation is easy to read and spies lack it when they know they have a home to go back to.

“Thanks,” he says to Natasha. “Get Bruce, I need his help with this.” He lifts his negotiated parts a little and Natasha nods, running off to do as he asked.

When Bruce returns he looks happy, “thank god, I was running out of water.”

Tony smiles a little, “be lucky you aren’t Natasha, she ran out two days ago. I think we can have this ready by nightfall if we work fast,” he tells Bruce. For his part Bruce looks excited, which makes sense considering he’s also fond of engineering. His specialty is more radiation based- he studies the affects of it on the more fried sections of land- and his results are sometimes useful as far as predicting where food will be. And his father told him letting Bruce look into his interests would hold no value. He’s now suspicious of anyone who claims information, not matter how useless it may seem on the surface, is useless. So far he hasn’t found information that’s useless yet and he’ll take every scrap of it that he can. What’s that old saying Rhodey told him once? Knowledge is power- right. He’s proved that several times over.

“How was Schmidt?” Bruce asks.

“Irritated with my presence but not nearly as much as his new blonde pit bull,” he says. Bruce frowns and Tony sighs, “type of dog, apparently they have strong jaws. Rhodey has referenced them before but its not like I’ve got a visual. But I like the way it sounds.” And Steve seems like a good physical representation of one of those dogs if his big mouth and stubborn disposition is any indication. He’d be much harder to manipulate than Schmidt and Tony doesn’t like that he has any kind of power. If he gets more of it that could cause him trouble and he already has enough of that.

“Thought you said dogs were pleasant,” Bruce says.

Tony shrugs, “that’s just what I’ve heard. If they catch rodents like the cats they’d definitely be useful.” Rhodey mentioned once that they used them for hunting, which would also carry its uses, but whatever dogs might be left there aren’t anywhere around here.

Bruce wrinkles his nose, “the cats need to pick up their slack, I found a rat in my bed this morning.”

Tony laughs, “a cat probably left it there for you. You know, as a present.” It’s a weird trait the animals have though they tend to leave Tony more ‘gifts’ than others and in the strangest of places.

“Cats need to come up with better gift ideas,” Bruce tells him. “Schmidt gave this stuff to you?” he asks, nodding to his acquired loot.

“Traded,” Tony corrects. “Figured I’d find out what that medicine we found was and Sam was right- antibiotics. Schmidt should watch his back though. His new second won’t be content with that position for long.” And Schmidt is too stupid to see it

Bruce raises an eyebrow. “Schmidt doesn’t strike me as a ‘second’ kind of guy. More like the minion type.”

He nods, “you aren’t wrong. And his fresh new face isn’t a minion. ‘Course he’s probably arrogant enough to think he doesn’t have a problem.”

“You think we will? Have a problem, I mean,” Bruce clarifies.

“No. I have more technological control than they’d like and I could fry them all if I felt like it. I doubt Schmidt’s new pet will be willing to sacrifice everyone in that bunker.” Bruce gives him a quizzical look and Tony knows what he’s asking without needing him to put it into words. “I have better places to start than genocide, none of them pleasant.” He _needs_ access to that tech though and he’ll do what he needs to in order to keep access to it. Hell, worst comes to worst he’ll move the city or as much of it as he can fit into the bunker after the bodies are cleared out. They could use more protection from the elements and quarrying stone is a real bitch not that they haven’t done well for themselves all things considered.

Their houses are relatively well crafted, the roofs leak sometimes, but the crown achievement for him at least is the Tower. That had been an architectural nightmare but he and Pep figured it out and it houses a huge portion of what used to be the homeless population. Took almost three years to complete, but it is the tallest building currently in existence that they know of. It’s only slightly hidden by the trees, which might have been a problem ten years ago considering it’s basically a beacon to the city, but these days everyone around knows where he is anyways.

It looks pretty at night when it’s lit, all the windows shining brightly. Most of its use, aside from homing the homeless, is weather protection. Acid rain, that strange fog, sandstorms in the summer, and ice storms in the winter- the building is resistant to all of it and the basement can store food for a large quantity of people. It saves a lot of trouble, and a lot of lives, when people are evacuated into it. Doesn’t stop the damage to the other buildings around, but it does at least help ensure they have the headcount to fix it later.

Bruce sighs, drawing his attention back to him. “I hope so Tony, because I’d rather not be anything like the Hydra or the Ten Rings, thanks.”

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose because he has no desire to be like that either- they’re brutal, barbaric, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do. But he’s hoping it doesn’t come to that.

*

The lights from the Tower cast shadows across the forest, making it more ominous than it actually is. Rhodey has told him stories of stories about forests and what lurk in them at night. Tony has never found anything more than bugs, the occasional wildlife, and even more occasionally refugees. But then Rhodey’s people are a lot more creative than his own group, always inventing things to keep themselves entertained. He wishes he had the free time to think up his own entertainment but living in a world that does more to kill you than allow you to thrive doesn’t leave room for imagination. What little he has goes to engineering.

“Are you okay?” a slightly high pitched voice asks and Tony turns, finding Peter there. He’s one of three people that even have access to this part of the Tower.

“I’m fine Peter- do you need something?” he asks. His voice is probably gentler than it is with anyone else but everyone knows he has a soft spot for kids. He used to avoid them, when he was younger, too afraid of being like his father, but when he’d been put in a position to be like him he couldn’t do it. He stopped avoiding kids after that and started helping them, not that everyone agrees with his methods. Peter doesn’t usually come up here though so he’s curious, wondering if maybe the kid will finally take him up on his offer to help him out where needed.

Peter shifts a little, “I… I don’t know, its probably nothing, kids make stuff up, but Charles saw them too and-”

Tony cuts him off. “To the point, kid.”

He sighs, “okay this is going to sound nuts but the kids keep seeing these… lights, I guess. In the sky. I thought they were just making things up, telling stories you know, but Charles saw them earlier too and why would he make things up?”

Tony’s eyebrows draw together. “Lights. In the sky? Like these lights?” he asks, nodding to the harsh yellow light flooding the room.

Peter shakes his head. “No. I questioned all the kids who’ve seen them and Charles and they all described the same thing. Forty-five kids and one grown man can’t agree on _anything_. They all said the lights were bright, almost white, but with a slight blue hue.”

Lights with a slight blue hue? “Obviously they’ve all gotten into something,” he says. “Ask what they’ve all eaten and drank in the last week or so.”

“I already had that thought but I’ve eaten all the same stuff they have and I’m not seeing any lights in the sky- that sounds crazy,” Peter says. Yeah, no shit.

“How long have people been seeing these… lights?” He doesn’t even want to entertain this but Peter is clearly freaked out so it’s his job to make sure the kid is fine.

“A couple weeks maybe? Only a couple kids at first but now most of the kids have seen them.”

Strange, certainly. But that leaves an obvious question for him, “why didn’t Charles tell me about this?” he asks.

Peter smiles a little, “he thought you’d take it better from me,” he admits softly. Tony smiles too because yeah actually, that’s true. He would have outright dismissed Charles, but if all these kids have seen something too…

Lights in the sky sounds nuts but Peter makes a point on groups of kids being unable to agree on anything. Shit, it’s not easier to gain agreement with adults either. “How often has everyone seen these lights?”

“Basically every night now,” Peter tells him, “but they already passed tonight.”

Maybe. But he’s still invested in seeing these lights, assuming people aren’t having a reaction to a plant or something that only a few of the kids, Peter included, happens to be immune to. “Take me to where people keep seeing these lights,” he says.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony and T'Challa meet!

Tony sits for hours staring at the sky and he sees nothing but star systems. Nothing here is unfamiliar and he rather likes it that way, and there are no lights in the sky. No strange ones anyways. He almost gives up at the first inklings of daybreak when he hears a soft buzzing noise, almost imperceptible in the insect noise around him. Immediately he scans the still dark sky, looking for something amiss and finds nothing for a long few moments. Then the buzzing gets a little louder and he sees them, the lights, and frowns because it reminds him of one of Rhodey’s stories.

Except those stories are more ridiculous than a lot of the others because they’re about _aliens_. Tony is certain no alien would want to hang out on this shithole planet; even _he_ doesn’t want to be here. So what the hell are those lights? And why are they almost certainly attached to some kind of flying vessel that looks like it defies the laws of aviation?

*

Steve notes that Rhodey looks tense and exchanges a look with Bucky. He looks uncomfortable with the situation, which is to be expected he supposes, but Steve is damn tired of being controlled by Schmidt and by Tony. So if Rhodey is going to cause trouble then he’s going to have to deal with the consequences. “Savages?” T’Challa asks, frowning slightly and Steve nods.

“You’ll understand when you see him,” he says. How the hell he’s managed to keep a stranglehold over them all Steve doesn’t know and at this point he doesn’t care either. What matters is that Shuri has ensured that Tony no longer has control over their systems and now he’s in the proper place to negotiate Tony the hell out of this bunker permanently.

“That’s _not_ true,” Rhodey mumbles more to himself than anyone else in the room. Steve gives him a sharp look and Rhodey glares back, defiant.

Beside him, T’Challa looks down to his sister and they communicate something but Steve isn’t sure what. “Well,” T’Challa murmurs, “I suppose we will.”

They wait for a long time, which isn’t entirely surprising considering the presumed distance between wherever Tony lives and the bunker, before he finally appears. He moves through the chambers too fast to bother with stripping his clothing the way he usually does but he’s locked out of the main door anyways so Steve isn’t really worried. When they finally see him, though he doesn’t look impressed, not that he ever does really. He always looks vaguely like he’s smelled something particularly unpleasant and he acts like everyone is secretly plotting his murder.

Oddly though the first person he looks at isn’t Steve despite him standing closest to the glass window that separates the two rooms- it’s T’Challa. T’Challa stares back, seemingly shocked but Tony’s face gives nothing away. His dark eyes remain as blank as they always are as he stares T’Challa down.

“I take it you were the one who attempted to remove me from the systems here” he states, not asks.

“Actually it was my sister,” T’Challa says, looking over to Shuri. Steve frowns, why the hell would he admit something like that?

Tony turns to give Shuri a shrewd stare, “smart girl. You didn’t dig deep enough though. J- lock them in,” he says and Steve’s eyebrows draw together. J?

“Of course, sir,” a voice says from the speakers, slightly accented in a way Steve doesn’t recognize. They hear the doors lock and the lights flicker out before the backup lights give the room an ominous orange glow.

“Can you fix this?” T’Challa asks Shuri.

“Of course, but that will take time and-” she stops for a moment and then continues in her native tongue. Steve doesn’t understand a lick of it but Tony leans forward intently like he _does_ and Steve thinks that’s ridiculous.

“You’re an idiot,” Rhodey hisses at him, shaking his head.

“I’m doing what’s best for us all,” he snaps back. The more time Tony spends here the more time he has to get further control over their systems. Why the hell Rhodey seems more offended that Steve wants Tony out than he is over Tony trying to use a small city’s worth of people as a fucking bargaining chip he has no clue. To him the more immoral person is obvious.

Rhodey rolls his eyes, “with Schmidt yeah, but with Tony? You don’t fuck with someone who’s smarter than you and has control over your shit, Steve, that’s suicide.”

Which is why he’s got Shuri. “She’s smarter,” he says as an explanation.

Rhodey looks over and nods, “probably, but Tony is resourceful and ruthless. Intelligence exists in multiple ways and if she can’t undo him on every account you’re fighting a losing battle. And something tells me she’s not nearly as motivated as he is.”

“He has an AI. A semi-autonomous AI built into your systems- this can’t be removed, not without rebooting everything, which would mean you’d end up with toxic air in here. Which is the point, I assume,” Shuri says to Tony.

He nods. “Not like any of you will die, you’re adapted. Walk away, don’t come back, and no one gets hurt,” Tony says like things are that simple.

A tall black woman steps forward and says something harsh to T’Challa in her native tongue, shaking her head at him and flinging a hand in the air in obvious frustration. Across the room Everett frowns, “do you think she speaks English?” he asks in what Everett probably thinks is a quiet voice.

“When I want to,” the woman answers.

“She says the king- T’Challa- is a bleeding heart and to leave you all here. You’re not Wakanda’s problem,” Tony translates. Every Wakandan eyebrow in the room rises in surprise.

“I’ve… heard stories about-” T’Challa starts but Tony cuts him off.

“The language you speak is similar to a nearly dead language- Xhosa. Obviously the rough translations of the words are similar enough to your language that I got the gist,” he says.

T’Challa frowns, “you know Xhosa?”

Tony shrugs, “I know several languages.” This is the first Steve has ever heard of this. As far as he knew Tony only spoke English though his accent is totally different from the way Steve and the others in the bunker speak. He assumed that was just because people must have learned a new dialect outside or something, not because English might not be Tony’s first language at all. Well fuck.

“How would you know a language that’s almost dead?” the tall black woman asks, squinting. Tony recognizes something in her that Steve doesn’t because he gives her a steely glare.

“I find things and I learn,” he says not that that explains anything.

“Can you find a way out of this?” T’Challa asks Shuri.

She nods, “there’s a way out of anything if you try hard enough. But it will take time when an AI is actively trying to lock me out.” She adds something else in her native tongue and Tony lets out a small laugh.

“Is that what he told you? Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. You probably should have listened to Rhodey,” Tony tells them, slight smirk on his face, and that pisses Steve off.

“What’s he mean ‘is that what he told you’?” he asks Shuri.

“Whoever these people are, they aren’t savages. At the very least you’re incredibly advanced. Probably science fiction advanced considering what we’ve been told of your conditions,” she adds to Tony, who frowns.

“Science fiction?” he asks.

“Stories about science that hasn’t yet been realized- sometimes the technology almost seems magical in nature,” T’Challa explains.

Tony doesn’t acknowledge the explanation, instead looking down at the small screen he’s carrying. It’s not like any of the tablets they have in the bunker so Steve isn’t entirely sure where he got it or even what it does. But he can probably safely assume that Tony is looking over the bunker’s systems. Shuri continues tapping away on her own device, which absolutely _does_ look like something out of a science fiction novel to Steve, and the room falls silent for a few long, tense moments.

“Stop,” the tall woman says to Shuri, placing a hand on her arm. Shuri looks up in surprise but the woman is looking over at Tony.

“What is it, Okoye?” Shuri asks.

Okoye considers Tony for a long moment; “he’s watching what you’re doing- probably as a way to gauge how intelligent you are.” Tony’s lips curl up a little so Steve is pretty sure she guessed right about that.

“Smart woman,” Tony murmurs and Okoye’s jaw clenches. Obviously it hadn’t occurred to her that she was letting her own brand of intelligence slip out there and unlike everyone in the bunker Tony understands enough of their language that they can’t use that as a way to communicate without giving themselves away.

*

Tony stomps back into town fucking _pissed_. He gets what, a day’s warning before some random people show up with some teen who’s definitely smarter than him, but unfamiliar with the bunker systems? Right now that’s all he’s got going for him and if Rhodey decides to clue her in he’s fucked out of that set of resources. It’s not that they can’t make do, they can and they have, but access to the knowledge and technology in that bunker has made their lives exponentially easier. It’s not like they haven’t tried looking for other bunkers, they’ve found plenty, but none of them had what that one did- including a population. He’s sure that should make him excited and if he didn’t have to worry about feeding a couple thousand people he’d probably be _right_ intrigued with the way no one in that bunker seems to have any resistance to the radiation.

But he _does_ have to feed the people he’s charged with taking care of so he has no time to give a damn about the people in the bunker. He needs whatever he can get from them and if he has something to give back he does his best. Truthfully they don’t need much though- they’re the ones with a self-sustaining system, no worries about the dramatic weather changes, kids, or other groups of people trying to kill them at a moment’s notice- they’re living the good life. The biggest threat they have is Tony and its been sufficiently proven that sure, he could kill them all by opening their vents, but if he hasn’t done it already to steal their resources it seems unlikely that he will.

If he had a true desire to kill them he wouldn’t have waited until someone showed up to make that possibility a more pressing decision, he would have just done it. But the people there are pampered and soft and they think he’s some kind of threat to their livelihood when he’s done nothing to earn that reputation. Natasha raises an eyebrow when she sees him and he gestures for her to follow him. She does without question until they make it to a slightly out of the way room in the Tower, “we have a problem,” he tells her.

“I gathered that,” Natasha tells him. “What exactly is our problem?”

He outlines the Wakanda problem and Natasha’s eyebrows fly up. “Wakanda? Wasn’t that in Africa? I thought that whole continent overheated.”

So did he. As far as he knows what used to be Europe is covered in ice, so is Canada, most of the islands that used to exist are underwater, the new ones are uninhabited, Asia got decimated with earthquakes so strong the west cost felt them, and even most of America didn’t survive. What the weather didn’t kill the radiation did. Guess that’s what happens when the planet decides to collectively fuck itself, ruining all the human-made systems and killing most of the population. But it was the nuclear plants that caused the most damage in the end.

It’s not like they’ve never tried to make contact with other people, they have, but no attempts had been successful outside their immediate area. Even then when he was young there were no neighboring settlements. People who’ve been alive that long, which isn’t a lot of people, talk about crossing a long desert before they found the trees that make up the large forest they live in. At first people generally got a long too, but then some asshole got greedy and now they aren’t very friendly with each other though they don’t usually go out of their way to torment each other either. It happens, of course, but not often. After he found the bunker he’d figured out how to make a radio though and he’s tried to send out signals. Rhodey says the bunker does the same, but Tony’s signals don’t go far with his minimalistic designs and no one has ever answered.

He isn’t sure where he is geographically according to old maps- the geography is so different that most of the country doesn’t even have the same borders. That had been why that damn bunker was so important- it’s obviously a remnant of a time before the whole world went to shit. It’s like a living time capsule, people and all, and the knowledge that the people hold there is invaluable. The technology, which is old yet advanced, is a monument to a time when people had the luxury of being able to just build that stuff. Now Tony does it to benefit his population even if he wants to do more, push it further and see where it can go. That’s not what he’s able to do right now though.

“Doesn’t matter whether or not Africa fried, obviously Wakanda managed to survive or at least some of them and whatever tech they have its way better than what I’ve found in that bunker,” he tells her.

Natasha considers his words for a long moment. “Do you think they’re a threat?” she asks softly.

He runs his fingers through his hair, “I hope not, Nat, because if they make themselves our business we won’t come out on the winning end.”

“We’ve dealt with war before,” she says softly.

“Not against people who probably have weapons that aren’t made from the stuff they can find in the environment. I’ve read about the kinds of weapons people used to have- we can’t win against that.” Doesn’t matter how good their strategy is, how well they know their environment- that would be a losing battle. This isn’t the Ten Rings; Okoye at least matches him or outdoes him in strategy given how fast she figured out that he had been using Shuri’s messing with his systems to determine how smart she was. Granted he hadn’t anticipated her being smarter but hey, what the hell else could go wrong at that point?

“Is there any reason to believe they have weapons like that? Doesn’t seem like you saw any,” Natasha points out.

No, but he has a feeling that isn’t entirely based on emotion but he isn’t telling Natasha about that. Right now… well, right now he’s hoping that he’ll be able to find a way to manipulate that soul bond for his own benefit. Preferably by getting T’Challa to go back to Wakanda and not come back. But he doesn’t know shit about soul bonds, just knows that they supposedly exist. He’s found a bunch of things in old texts he’s dredged up but he thought they were fairy tales. Frankly, he’s glad he ran into the information at all or he would have been even more confused by that… _feeling_ he got when he ran into T’Challa. The one that seemed to almost put a spotlight on him like ‘hey, this one is special.’ He knows T’Challa saw it too; he didn’t really make an effort to hide it the way Tony had, and that’s useful for him to know.

“One of them had this staff thing. Kind of looked like a spear, but it’s not like anything I’ve ever seen. It was metal and had a weird tip that I’d normally deem useless given the inefficient looking design but my guess is that it’s not exactly your average spear. Coupled with the few other things I saw, I think its safe to say they have weapons that are better than ours. They have airships.” He _knows_ the lights from that weird ship thing he saw was them, they have to be. It’s too coincidental that he’s seen them so close together.

Natasha sighs, running her hand through her short hair. “Okay. So what the hell do we do?” she asks.

“For now? Nothing. We don’t know for sure that they’re a threat, but we need them out of that damn bunker.” Might be easier than it sounds considering Shuri and Okoye at least don’t underestimate him, T’Challa might be able to be persuaded with that soul bond, and Rhodey clearly hadn’t liked Steve’s plan. He’s probably not the only one who doesn’t like that plan so maybe Tony can do something with that. He happens to know Rhodey works with the bunker’s security; he can get in contact with him if needed.

Natasha goes to respond but Peter bursts into the room looking distraught, “um. We have a maybe problem,” he says.

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose, “what is it, Peter?” he asks, knowing that if Peter has been sent to him whoever it was that found whatever problem wants him to be in a good mood when he gets the bad news.

Peter fidgets a little, “well um, you remember the Black Order right?” he asks and Tony lets out a long breath, looking away. Great, now they’ve got bigger problems than Wakanda _or_ the bunker. They used to be a myth until they wiped out seven nearby villages but after a battle gone wrong with Tony, he accidentally drove them back. He should have anticipated that they’d return but it’s been years… “She claims she’s a refugee,” Peter adds. “But no one really knows if they should believe her considering the last time one of them claimed that.”

Yeah, Tony remembers that too. “Okay,” he says, “make sure no one comes near us.” He sidesteps Peter, who sputters a little but it’s Natasha who speaks.

“What the fuck Tony, you can’t just walk over and ask what’s going on,” she says.

“I can and I will. Then you’re going to stick us in quarantine just in case this is another attempt at biological warfare,” he says.

He walks off and Peter lets out another yelp, running after him with Nat hot on his heels. “No, I’m not ready to lead!” Peter squeaks out.

“You’ll do fine, kid. You’ve been in charge of the children for years and you manage that well,” he points out.

“Charles is in charge of the kids!” Peter says.

Tony snorts, “kid, he takes orders from you. Natasha, you might want to train him to be more observant,” he says. There’s a lot he hasn’t taught Peter but he’s a quick learner. He’ll make do.

“I am not training him to be more anything, you get back here!” she tells him, catching up with him pretty easily due to her longer legs. “This is stupid,” she adds.

Probably, but he’s got no choice. “Natasha, leave it,” he tells her in a tone that has her backing down immediately even though she doesn’t want to. He doesn’t make orders often, but when he does, people listen. Some might call it respect, he wonders if it’s because of his past, but in moments like this he can’t complain.

He finds the refugee easily, slumped against a tree at the edge of town with a small gathering of people at a safe distance. The crowd murmurs anxiously when he breaks the line of arbitrary safety but Natasha goes on crowd control duty immediately and tells them all to stay back. “You’re brave,” Tony tells his fresh new refugee.

She glares up at him, “out of all the groups of people here I figured you’d be the least likely to kill me on sight.”

“Yeah, we’ll see about that. Why are you here?” he asks bluntly.

Nebula, he knows who she is partially because of the stories that follow her around but only because those stories gave her a color scheme, glares at him. Blue and purple permeate the fabrics she wears- and its a combination Tony thinks is offensive to the eye but then he isn’t fond of either color or most colors on that half of the color wheel honestly. “I had a sister,” she says slowly, “we weren’t close, we weren’t allowed to be close but… You need to understand she was all I had. He killed her. He fucking _killed_ her,” she says, shaking her head sharply as she clenches her jaw, tears welling up in her eyes. She’s not faking it, Tony can tell. He knows loss well and faking a visceral emotion like that is almost impossible.

“So what, he killed plenty of my family too,” someone yells from the gathered crowd. Tony holds up his hand as the murmurs spread fast and they die out as fast as they rose up.

“Come with me,” he says, earning a bunch of shocked looks but no one speaks out against him. At the least, Tony thinks, he can figure out what the hell Thanos has been up to lately and try and solve a problem before he actually has one. The crowd parts for him easily, all shying away from Nebula, who limps along behind him. “What happened to you?” he asks her as they approach the Tower, nodding at her limp.

Nebula’s jaw clenches. “I’ve never lived up to expectations- trying to get my revenge for Gamora didn’t suddenly help me out,” she snarls in a low tone.

“You were abused,” Tony translates. Nebula looks surprised for a moment before that anger takes back over and she nods.

“Never was good enough. Every time I lost a fight was a day won in isolation. I spent a lot of time alone,” she murmurs. Tony knows the feeling well, actually. Howard hadn’t much liked when he spoke out against him and it resulted in him being locked away too. The effects didn’t really stick- he’s far more resilient that Howard would ever give him credit for, but it was grueling nonetheless.

“Isolation isn’t an option when we have a town of people to run,” he tells her softly. He notes her reaction, the way her shoulders droop a little in relief, the way her clenched jaw relaxes some. Its not the reaction someone would have if they were acting as a biological weapon, but Tony isn’t taking his chances either.


	3. Chapter 3

“These people aren’t our problem,” Okoye tells him in a frustrated tone. T’Challa doesn’t bother contacting Nakia because he already knows what she will say, and Ayo has made her opinion clear as well. Shuri is the only one who disagrees with them and that is, T’Challa thinks, because she’s curious about Tony. Too bad he wasn’t _her_ soul mate. That might make this easier for him if that were the case.

“I’m aware of that but… they are some of the only people we’ve found across the _world_ and they managed to contact us. I don’t think we should ignore that,” he says. And he’s curious about Tony, who seems… wild, untamed. Savage is the word Steve used- what an _odd_ name- but T’Challa isn’t entirely sure that’s the best description for him. But he isn’t convinced the description is wrong either.

“So what?” Ayo says harshly, “this expedition has been a waste of resources as it is, we shouldn’t waste more on a group of people with problems that aren’t ours.”

“It’s harsh,” Okoye says, “but not entirely wrong. What business do we have meddling in the affairs of people we don’t know or understand? We have no context for the people here and without that getting involved in their affairs is a dangerous risk.”

T’Challa turns to Shuri, silently asking her opinion. “We set out to explore- we should continue that. Understanding these people is a good thing for us all-” she starts but Ayo cuts her off.

“How so? What does understanding them do for Wakanda?” she asks and Okoye gives her a sharp look. She doesn’t look impressed but she stops talking, looking away with her jaw clenched.

“Why should it have to do anything for Wakanda?” Shuri asks. “We should explore for the sake of it, because knowledge is important. Learning for the sake of learning should be our priority- not politics,” she looks at T’Challa, “and not Wakanda,” she looks at Ayo. “Increasing understanding of things that are different than us is necessary for progress in a personal, political, and economic sense anyways,” she adds.

They all turn to T’Challa, wanting his opinion and he sighs. “Shuri is right. We should make an effort to learn about these people- we’ve come this far already.” It had been his father’s wish, to open themselves up to the rest of the world, see what else may be out there. T’Challa decided to follow through on it when he died, wanting to honor his wishes, but until recently they hadn’t found much. They’ve found some evidence of people living in a few other parts of the world, but never found the actual people until now. And these people happened to reach out to _them_.

The message was old, Steve told them, a remnant of the last bits of civilization in America, but it did its job. They’d all been shocked to pick up the radio message and set course to find the source immediately. T’Challa half expected to find nothing of use but instead he’d found a bunker full of people and apparently a whole group outside the bunker too.

None of that is why he’s choosing to stay though. Truthfully he agrees more with Okoye than Shuri- knowledge is important, but the last thing they need is to involve themselves in a political mess with people they don’t understand no matter what kind of help they might need. But… he’s heard all the legends, read the stories- he’s curious about his soul mate. Bast obviously wants them together for some kind of purpose or she wouldn’t have connected him to Tony, right? He must have some kind of purpose here.

He resists telling the others that though because he knows they will disapprove minus perhaps Shuri and Nakia. Shuri would probably want to run a million experiments and Nakia is a sympathetic person, she would want him to explore his emotions and come to a conclusion that way.

Despite the fact that Okoye and Ayo disagree with him they say nothing to contradict him.

*

Tony is irritated with Nebula but she appears to be telling the truth. “Great,” he mumbles, “we don’t know anything about Thanos either.”

Nebula, sharp in intelligence, tilts her head to the side. “What do you mean ‘either’? What else do you have to worry about?” she asks.

He wonders how her astute nature made her the _inferior_ sibling out of the group. That he at least got knowledge on and wow Thanos is one fucked up piece of shit. Even at his worst, he’d never collect children as _war prizes_ and then train them to be his army. He’s always had a soft spot for kids though. “Literally everything around here is constantly trying to kill us,” he lies, sort of. “We’ve got plenty to keep us busy.”

It’s clear that Nebula doesn’t buy this but she seems to know she’s not trusted either. Even after three days and no obvious effects on hers or Tony’s systems he’s not stupid enough to trust Nebula. Just because she wasn’t sent in as a weapon doesn’t mean she isn’t a spy or that she’s lacking her own agenda in the absence of Thanos’. He doesn’t think she’s lying about any of that either, her bitterness and grief are too raw. He’s met other people from the Black Order, been in towns after they were attacked- none of them are this good at faking emotion.

“When will I be off house arrest?” she asks instead, changing the subject.

No clue so he tells her that. “Considering where you come from Natasha will probably be up your ass for years,” he says honestly. Natasha is far less trusting than he is and that’s saying something.

Nebula makes an annoyed noise, “great,” she mumbles.

“Make yourself useful and that might not be a shitty as it sounds,” Tony tells her. People with a specialized use fare better here- not everyone can do Natasha’s job. Not everyone can lead the way he does. No one so far but Pepper has displayed her talent with food _or_ organization. She’s helpful on two levels and that makes her invaluable. He’s sure Nebula’s sharp observation skills and likely adequate combat skills will be of use.

Given the generally looming threat of the Ten Rings and HYDRA around their boarders her skills are probably more useful than most of the city’s. Most of them do basic manual labor and those that are better at it run the projects. Its all work that requires skills, but they are the more replaceable skills if for no other reason than that being an easier job to learn not that its entirely easy to execute correctly. But they don’t necessarily rely on the labor to survive the way they did with Pepper’s cooking skills.

“Define ‘useful’,” Nebula says in a low, rough tone.

Tony shrugs, “learn how to cook like Pepper and you’ll be one of the most important people in this town. Plus she can use the help.” Sure she delegates, but if anyone else is in charge it doesn’t seem to matter how closely they follow her recipes they never come out right. And someone always inevitably miscounts so they have to cut rations more than they already do.

“I already know how to cook,” Nebula tells him.

He snorts, “not like Pepper, you don’t. We can all roast a squirrel over a fire, that’s not hard. But making it taste like something edible is.” Thank god for Pepper’s discovery of spices. Sometimes, if they find other bunkers in the near by area, they find some spices too and bring them to Pepper. She probably has a decent collection now but there are only so many bunkers and Tony is pretty sure they’ve found most of them. What they haven’t found he’s sure the Ten Rings or HYDRA has. Or maybe the Black Order, he’ll ask Nebula about it later.

*

He’s playing chess with Peter, assessing his skill in strategy not that he’s telling Peter that. The point is assessing how he does without pressure and then Tony will compare it to when he _does_ know it’s a test. He’ll need to be able to perform well under pressure and Natasha has informed him that he barely kept his shit together when Tony was stuck with Nebula for three days. Eventually they were cleared and now Nebula is in the fields picking crops. It’s probably the shittiest job there is, minus the people who deal with the actual shit, but Tony figured it was a good place to put her. Means she’s always in an open area where everyone can see her- just in case.

“I’m glad you’re not dead or sick,” Peter says eventually. Even without the knowledge that this is a test he’s struggling due to his stress over Tony’s predicament.

“You know that you’ll have to make hard decisions like that too, right?” he asks softly. He doesn’t want to stress the kid but the truth is that life here is difficult and death is always around the corner. Tony is already living on borrowed time so Peter needs to catch up.

Peter frowns, “like what you did with Nebula? That’s easy, I would do that too. I don’t want other people to get sick and its an easy way to interrogate her at the same time without risking anyone else or losing the information. Its everything _else_ I’m not good at,” he says.

Hmm, Tony hadn’t considered that. He thought his distress was from the potential of death by some nasty infection, not every day life. Maybe he’s been training Peter in all the wrong areas. It occurs to him that maybe the easiest way to see where Peter needs to improve is to watch him take over the various roles he has to do. That’s the fastest and most efficient way of finding Peter’s weaknesses. And after that he can work on eliminating them or learning how to mitigate them.

“Tell me what your worries are, kid,” Tony tells him, moving his pawn into a bad position purposefully. Peter takes the bait easily; it’s not something he even thinks about. Good.

“I don’t know. I just don’t think I can handle that much responsibility,” Peter says.

He can, he does it all the time. “Its not much different than what you do with the kids. Except adults pull knives when they throw tantrums. I wish I was kidding,” he says when Peter looks concerned.

Peter lets out a soft noise of annoyance, “the kids are easy. Just run around with them a little bit so they don’t get bored. That’s not the same as planning infrastructure and all that other stuff.”

Tony snorts, “the kids are not easy. They all run around doing stupid shit all day and nearly die because no one has taught them that falling into one of the traps around camp will probably result in their deaths. Plus there’s seventy of them- that many anything isn’t easy to deal with. It’s a matter of learning the right skills to deal with your responsibilities. And you make sure the kid’s houses aren’t fucked every time we have a storm so technically you deal with infrastructure too,” he points out.

Their game continues and Tony makes a few more bad moves that Peter picks up on fast. “I guess. But it doesn’t feel the same.”

Maybe, but it is. “What you’re doing now is the smaller scale of what you’ll do here. You make sure everyone has food, clothing, shelter- then you make sure that everyone’s feelings are generally soothed, and then you deal with all the inevitable problems that comes with all of that. And on top of that you need to be as aware of the boarders as I am, you have to know all the right protocols to follow when there’s storms, invasions, Nebula showing up, whatever. That’s not a small set of tasks or a small set or responsibilities. Most adults here don’t to that much.” They settle into more specialized tasks and hone their skills there. And that’s another thing Peter does- watch the children for any skill they might excel at over others. Even Tony doesn’t do that; he just takes Peter’s word for it. He tells Peter that too, because it’s important that he have faith in himself. Tony didn’t have that when he started this job and everyone suffered for it.

Peter considers all of this until he wins the game and frowns. “You let me win. You’re never this bad at chess,” he says immediately. Good then, he’ll be able to tell when someone is faking him out with deliberately bad strategy. Now he’s just got to make sure Peter calls him on it as soon as he senses it. In an actual battle you need to be able to sense when things are going too right and to pull back before you accidentally get lured into a space you don’t want to be in. Its not fun to fight your way out of a corner, he’s had to do it more times than he’d care to admit.

“Yeah, I did. You still played well though,” he says. Peter has a talent for the game and Tony will do his best to ensure that those talents will carry to other places.

Peter frowns at the board for a moment before he sighs, sitting back, “why me though? Other people could have done this job,” he points out. “What makes me so special?”

So this is what this confidence thing is about? His not knowing why he, specifically, was chosen? “You’re a reluctant leader,” Tony says and Peter frowns.

“Isn’t that a bad thing?” he asks.

Tony shakes his head, “not necessarily. Some people are natural leaders- they can pull people to them easily and convince them that they’re doing the right thing. Other people have natural leadership skills but choose when they want to exercise them, stepping in when no one else will or when something goes wrong. Some people are a combination of the two. In my experience reluctant leaders tend to be the best kind. They don’t tend to like their responsibilities, but they do them anyways because they’re good at it and because they know people need guidance. They want to help people. I saw that in you years ago, even when you were still small.”

“So like you,” Peter says and Tony shakes his head.

“No, not at all like me. I’m charming and people are often caught up in that- it’s led to bad results because my ability to lead is directly related to how charmed people are by me. I had to learn how to turn that off and actually _do_ something rather than just relying on likability. You don’t have that problem- you naturally listen to people and react to their needs even if they aren’t talking to you directly. You have a natural ability to intuit things in a way I had to learn and I think it makes you better suited for the job than your peers.” Riri is too caught up in her own thoughts, but she’s great with tech. She’ll easily replace him there. Kamala has a lot of wisdom, but not a lot of knowledge on how to act on it. And Harley can charm the hair off a cat but he’s constantly getting into shit he shouldn’t be. Reminds Tony of himself at that age, actually. But out of all of the people he picked out as having some kind of leadership skills Peter showed the most promise.

He’s got Kamala’s wisdom, but he also knows when to use it. And even better he knows when _not_ to use it. He’s got at least a little of Harley’s charm but he’s never relied on it, and he’s smart like Riri but not hindered by it the way she is. She has a hard time getting out of her head where Peter can communicate his ideas clearly and efficiently. Tony doesn’t have that talent either- he’s also mostly caught in his own thoughts like Riri. Always has been. Peter will be a better leader than him and that’s the entire point- people here need to move _forward_ , have something better to look towards in the future and Peter will do that for them.

“I don’t know. I think someone else could probably do a better job,” Peter says so Tony calls him on it.

“Give me a candidate,” he says, serious. Peter _does_ spend more time with the kids so its possible he knows something Tony doesn’t. He doubts it, he’s been watching Peter’s age group for years, but its still possible Peter knows something he doesn’t.

“Harley is a good leader,” he says eventually.

Tony smiles, pleased that Peter managed to pick from the group he already determined to be above the rest as far as leadership skills go. “When’s the last time Harley ever took charge in an emergency situation?” he asks

Peter frowns, “okay maybe not him. Kamala helps out with that stuff, though.”

“Does she follow what you tell her to do or does she find more efficient ways of getting the same results?” Tony asks. He already knows the answer to this because Peter had been the only one who passed that test accidentally years ago.

“I… but… well Riri could probably do that. She’s really smart,” Peter says.

“Is she able to explain her ideas or does someone else translate them for her?” he asks, knowing the answer to this too. Whenever Riri gets stuck its always Peter who finds a way to explain to others what she means- she’s smart as hell, but her ability to explain that in ways everyone understands isn’t there at all.

It clicks with Peter then and he sits up a little. “Oh. I guess I didn’t really see it that way,” he says.

“See it what way?” Tony asks, wondering how the kid will manage to sum all that up.

“That I guess I’m the one who knows how to best deal with people even in bad situations, that I think on my feet in a way the other’s don’t, and that I’m good at those things because I can get my ideas across easier than the others,” he says efficiently.

Tony smiles, “and there you go kid- _that’s_ why I chose you. Because I know you’ll be good at it, and because I know you won’t abuse the power you’ll have. You’re a great kid, Peter, give yourself the credit you deserve.”

Peter nods, “well yeah. I mean I have to use this position for good, if I don’t people get hurt. I can’t do that to them,” he says, balking at the idea. Of course not, Tony knows, because Peter knows the value of responsibility and doesn’t often fall under the weight of it.

“I know, kid. You’ll do great things,” Tony tells him, hoping it’ll get through this time.

He doesn’t expect it but Peter gets up, rounds the table and hugs him. Usually that’s something limited to Rhodey and its… odd, awkward. But Peter needs the comfort right now and the kids are always more affectionate anyways. They haven’t been alive long enough to lose their hope and their desire for affection along with it.

He hugs Peter back, hoping that he’ll never have to suffer that fate either but knowing that’s impossible. This is a harsh, unforgiving world and there will be a time when even Peter won’t be able to deal with it anymore, but he hopes that Peter will have the good sense to choose someone like himself to lead their people into the future. Maybe some day they’ll be able to keep their child-like wonder until they’re adults. It’s a pipe dream, but Tony hopes there will be a time when it can be a reality.


	4. Chapter 4

T’Challa doesn’t know how to approach Tony but decides perhaps a direct line of action would be best. Locating the camp hadn’t been difficult with Steve’s directions but it does feel strangely quiet when they approach. “I don’t like this,” Okoye murmurs at him in their native tongue. He couldn’t _believe_ Tony actually understood it, apparently pieced together by learning another similar language. He’d heard stories about soul mates being able to feel what the other feels, to share memories and languages so he’d thought Tony’s knowledge extended from that but apparently not. Knowing that had been a little disappointing.

“Lets hope things are quiet because they’re a small population,” he murmurs. Not that they’re in much danger even if they _do_ have a larger population- their weapons are absolutely more advanced. He hadn’t needed much information to determine that, but Steve’s knowledge that Tony mostly used the bunker as a place to scour for technology told him a lot of what he needed to know. Shuri’s poking around the bunker systems told him the rest. Though Steve also mentioned that the pieces Tony took never made any sense, that nothing he took would ever work together. Shuri is sure he made something else entirely out of his scavenged pieces but T’Challa is unsure what to think.

They continue forward carefully, on the lookout for things that are out of place. It takes some time before they hear a voice. “I wouldn’t take another step if I were you,” a familiar voice says. T’Challa would have stepped forward anyways, unafraid, but Okoye holds her spear out in front of him, scanning the ground for a moment before she seems to find something. She pulls her spear back before jabbing the ground a step and a half in front of T’Challa’s feet with the butt of it, triggering a snare that works at a shocking speed. “Told you,” Tony tells him in a pleasant voice that doesn’t match his shrewd stare.

Okoye regards him suspiciously but T’Challa takes her lack of an attack as a sign of good will. Tony did warn them of the trap, it makes sense to T’Challa to keep things peaceful. “You’re here for a reason,” Tony states, not asks. “What is it?” His voice is cool and businesslike- impersonal. T’Challa doesn’t like it.

He glances over at Okoye for a moment, unsure if he wants to disclose this information to her, but decides it’s for the best ultimately. She will figure it out eventually anyways so it might be best to say it now. “Are you… not curious about your soul mate?” he asks, a little confused. Okoye goes from suspicious to shocked, giving Tony a once over in a new way. Like she’s regarding an equal, not a potential enemy. Tony notices the shift and relaxes marginally but he doesn’t look more interested in the conversation now.

“Not particularly, no,” he says. The look on his face must be something to see because Okoye reaches out and settles her hand on his shoulder.

“We have no vested interest in that bunker- we thought they were the only people left in the world besides us when we first found them. We know it’s not our place to stick our noses into political situations we don’t understand,” Okoye tells Tony.

Tony considers her words for a long moment, contemplating the weight of her statement. “I’m guessing you’re in charge given the way she protected you,” Tony says to T’Challa. “Is that her opinion or yours?”

Okoye looks at him and her opinion on what he should say is clear and to be fair they do share this particular view. “We don’t know how this feud started and we were curious about meeting other people, not particularly invested in participating in what sounds like pre-war activities when we don’t even understand the context of the war. We have better things to do.” Better places to expend their resources, too. Wakanda was interested in finding people, not war. They’d been lucky Steve backed down the first time they all met, unwilling to potentially sacrifice his people, or he would have been stuck in the middle of this regardless of his feelings towards it.

Tony takes his time thinking this over before he responds. “Who told you to enter on the south side of the village?” he asks.

T’Challa frowns at the subject change. “Rhodey, why?”

“Just wondering. Anything else you wanted to tell me while you’re here?” he asks. His patience is waning, T’Challa can tell.

“You _really_ have no interest in your soul mate? None at all?” T’Challa asks. “You _do_ know what a soul mate is right?” he asks, remembering these people don’t have the kind of access to language and text that he does.

It’s the wrong thing to say because Tony goes from mildly irritated to angry in a matter of seconds or less. “Yeah I know what a fucking soul mate is but I don’t have time for fairy tales. I have people to keep alive so I don’t give a damn about some baseless supposedly biological phenomenon with no real science behind it,” he snaps. “Walk any further and you’ll run into nastier things than snares,” he tells them and with that he turns and walks away.

Okoye turns and squints at him like he’s stupid. “Why are you looking at me like that?” he asks.

“‘Do you know what a soul mate is?’” she repeats. “He’s not stupid, T’Challa.”

“I didn’t say he was, it just occurred to me that I might have more knowledge on the subject than him. Its not like they have formal education,” he points out.

“You don’t know that, you don’t know anything about these people. Do not make a fool out of yourself or your country making assumptions based on information from a clearly biased source,” Okoye tells him, shaking her head as she walks back the way they came. She takes care to watch the ground as she walks, obviously having no interest in falling into traps.

*

“He’s your _what_?” Pepper asks, eyes bugging a little.

Tony rolls his eyes, “he’s nothing important,” he says honestly. And T’Challa isn’t- he’s a guy Tony barely knows who’s got a weird connection to him _supposedly_. Any old texts he’s come across showed that previous populations- which were high enough that there was near overcrowding on the planet- didn’t know anything about them either. Some stuff claimed it was a biological connection, others claimed it was a social construction; some claimed it was both with a slant one way or the other. Current populations thought they were a myth because no one here has ever had a soul mate. Supposedly they used to be rare but abundant enough that people still had hope of finding theirs but Tony had never bought into the idea.

Of course he has little choice but to accept it now, but he doesn’t believe in the significance of soul mates. Old texts made them sound like these elevated connections, some even suggested _psychic_ connections between pairs. And they were always pairs, too- romantic pairs. The trends of soul mates were obvious reading about them- soul mates are romantic, they’re mostly heterosexual pairings, and they also tended to be between people of the same race. Tony’s experience already eliminates most of that assumed knowledge so he’s skeptical.

Though if he were alive in more populated times he suspects he’d be skeptical to such a convenient soul mate set up. What are the chances that you only have one soul mate in a potentially reproductive couple? A few things he’s read said the purpose was reproduction but he knows damn well people don’t need soul mates to do that for one, and also if that were the case why only _one_ soul mate?

To him it makes sense that you have a whole bunch- more chances of a viable fetus that way or maybe that’s an opinion formed by a high infant mortality rate, who knows. But he does think his knowledge of soul mates is not one that’s informed by a strong basis of real soul mate experiences. If soul mates were expected to be reproductive couples of the same race anyone who didn’t fit the bill would be unlikely to admit to their connection and that means all knowledge is skewed. It irritates him knowing that because it means he’s in a knowledge deficit and T’Challa is obviously from a society that kept its shit together through the end of the world or recovered quickly after. Tony doesn’t like that T’Challa probably knows more about soul mates than he does. Holding more knowledge than your opponent is crucial to strategy and T’Challa’s potentially knowing more than him may yield unpleasant results.

The good news is that all that stuff of psychic connections is sure to be utter bullshit. Tony doesn’t believe people share minds, that’s more absurd than the notion of one single soul mate in the whole world. Or at least in a populated world- in this world it seems even more unlikely but here he is.

“You’ve read about soul mates, Tony. What if all that stuff is true?” Pepper asks, clearly thinking along the same lines he had been.

He shakes his head, “Pep, we all read that stuff and most of the pairs were reproductive couples of the same race. T’Challa and I aren’t a reproductive couple _or_ the same race- what are the chances most of that other stuff will be true?” he asks. Already so much is flying in the face of what he knows so is the information inaccurate or is he an exception to soul mate rules? T’Challa could very well have an answer to that and he doesn’t like it.

“He makes a point,” Natasha tells them, rounding the corner she was obviously hiding behind. Tony glares at her, irritated that she’d been spying. He only likes that trait when it’s convenient to him. Pepper looks skeptical to her words though. “Come on Pepper, that stuff sounded crazy, we all thought it was fake.”

“And its not so how much more of this are we going to ignore until its proven right?” she asks.

Tony shakes his head. “You don’t believe something until you see real proof it exists otherwise you’re chasing fairy tales. Its why Sam tests all his meds, its why I test my tech, and its why you test your recipes- you need to see if it _works_ before you can form an opinion. All we know about soul mates is that they exist and even at that the supposed bond I have goes against the other knowledge gathered on the subject.” And its possible that he’s the weird guy out, there’s always _someone_ that sticks out. Like Kamala appears to be allergic to nuts while no one else is, and Peter breaks out in rashes when he comes in contact with certain plants when no one else does. But he’s not sure where he falls with this soul mate thing. And he still can’t help but feel the knowledge gathered previously felt convenient, not correct.

Pepper lets out a huff of air, “if you refuse to speak with the guy how the hell are we supposed to know what is and isn’t real?” she asks.

Good point but Tony has no desire to test that knowledge. Where the bond comes from, how it forms, and _why_ it forms was never answered in the stuff he found and with no use for the connection Tony sees no real use in keeping it. T’Challa’s guard already stated that they had no interest in the bunker, T’Challa confirmed it. That’s all Tony needs to know to ensure that this is the right decision. The only reason he would have explored it was to get them out of the bunker and they did that themselves.

For once he got an easy solution. And aside from that maybe he thinks that psychic connections are the work of overactive imaginations, like those books that Rhodey tells him about in the bunker, but he thought that about soul mates too and that ended up being wrong. It doesn’t mean the information gathered is all accurate though, and even if it is the idea of a soul mate sounds more… what was that word Rhodey used to describe book with oppressive societies? Dystopian, right. Soul mates sound dystopian; especially if the information is accurate- imagine the idea of someone sharing your thoughts, dreams, _skills_ \- that is nothing short of invasive and disturbing, not romantic. Besides, they can’t afford someone in his head, _he_ can’t afford that.

“I already got what I needed out of T’Challa. I don’t need to spend more time with him than strictly necessary,” he says. Pepper frowns but Natasha nods in approval.

“Well, that’s one problem solved,” she says, looking a little relieved. Tony too even if the problem is only half solved- they still have Steve to contend with but at least Shuri is out of those systems. Granted she could ignore T’Challa’s decisions but he’s not entirely sure she would. He’s seen the way people react to T’Challa- its clear that they have a good amount of respect for their leader.

Steve isn’t lacking for the amount of problems he can cause though, so really they’ve only lost one major issue only to have kept another even if Tony is more sure he can wrangle Steve into cooperation than T’Challa. He’s got enough leverage to force him to cooperate again; it’s just that it’ll be tedious.

“Since when do you turn down an opportunity to learn something?” Pepper asks, thinking of a question Natasha never would. She runs on a practical level and only engages with emotions when she’s forced to and only if she wants to notice the inconsistencies and patterns. Pepper picks up on all that stuff naturally and for once it’s a trait Tony finds annoying instead of useful.

“Since I ran into a group of people with the potential to wipe us out. Best that we get rid of them as fast as possible,” he says. It’s not really a lie, but he doesn’t think T’Challa has much of an interest in stirring up trouble. He doesn’t think he meant to stir things up in the bunker either but there’s the possibility he might change his mind and Tony doesn’t want to see the results.

“And you don’t want to learn about all this tech you keep talking about? When you found Schmidt’s bunker you didn’t shut up about it for _weeks_ and now you’re talking about stuff you didn’t think was possible with what we have left and you’re letting it walk away? What the hell are you so afraid of? And don’t give me some stupid answer we both know isn’t true,” Pepper adds, irritated with his half truths.

Whatever answer she’s looking for she isn’t going to get. Tony doesn’t need a soul mate, this city doesn’t need him to have a soul mate, and sure he wants to know all about Wakanda’s technology but he isn’t going to do it at the potential cost of his people’s safety. They were just fine before Wakanda showed up and they will be fine after, at least so long as they keep their distance.

*

T’Challa admires Tony’s outline against the Wakandan sunset. He looks stunning there in clothing T’Challa had made for him. It’s cleaner than his regular clothing, tailored to his body and the results are pleasant to look at. Tony turns, smiling a little when he does. “What?” he asks, amusement playing at his tone.

“Nothing,” T’Challa says, shaking his head. “I was just admiring the view.”

Tony turns to look back out the large window facing the setting sun. “This is incredible- everything is tinted green back home with this weird haze over stuff. Here it looks like the sky is on fire,” he says, eyes bright as he looks out the window. There’s a curiosity there, a desire to learn why that is. T’Challa will explain it to him at some point but for now he’s more interested in Tony.

He’s so strange to T’Challa in every way. The way he acts is so bizarre- he’s so suspicious and quick to judge but he’s got this burning curiosity for the world around him. He’s seen and heard of the way Tony collects knowledge, cherishes it. It’s a strange juxtaposition between the way Tony chooses to act due to his environment and the way he is underneath that. It makes T’Challa sad to see that Tony has to let go of a lot of his natural curiosity in favor of a suspicion that feels learned.

He doesn’t particularly want to think of how Tony came to learn to be suspicious of everything that comes into his life perhaps because of his own fears of failure. He’s never taken failure very well and Tony shares an uncomfortably close position in his society to T’Challa’s. He doesn’t want to think of the possibility that somehow Tony’s failures will influence his own through their bond or something.

Then of course there’s the way Tony’s looks are totally foreign to him. Obviously they all know about the different races of people that used to exist- they still have some movies, pictures, and news from other areas of the world outside of Wakanda but after the world tried to end itself they thought they were all that was left. Wakanda nearly split in two after all the earthquakes, then came the blast of storms, radiation, and the massive death toll that came with it all.

The fact that they managed to survive all that is nothing short of a miracle and even then the extreme weather coupled with the radiation they almost died out. As usual vibranium had been their saving grace- a blessed gift from Bast that allowed them to power through the adversity. But they thought they were the only ones that managed.

They looked around the landmass they ended up on, vibranium mountain and all, and they looked on the land they could get to easily as well. But they found nothing so they went back to the way things have always been in Wakanda. They’ve survived for centuries on their own so they went back to doing just that. It hadn’t been something anyone questioned until his father. He’d been determined to look for life elsewhere, convinced they weren’t the only ones left on this planet but people hadn’t much cared for the idea.

When he died T’Challa decided to pick it up and continue with it, not really expecting to find anything. Instead he found that his father was right, and it led him to Tony. Sometimes he wonders if Bast had planted the seed of exploration in his father’s head with the intent of getting T’Challa to leave the country, to explore far enough to find her gift- his soul mate.

He never would have expected him to be so different though. He expected someone more like… well, Nakia. Tony isn’t so bad though, even if his features are strange and foreign. His hair texture is different, it’s got a far looser curl than his own and it’s finer, and softer. His skin is obviously far paler and much more sensitive to the sun- too much exposure turns him a bright red. His own skin doesn’t show the burn, he just feels it later. Tony’s skin tans though, more than a lot of the other pale people he spends time with. Both his general and his cook just turn red and go back to the same milky tone they had before while Tony’s skin turns a pretty brown. He suspects Tony has a different ancestry than they do and Tony suspects it too.

Other features are different too, like his nose and lip shape, and his narrow face. His eyes, though, are the same deep brown T’Challa is familiar with and framed by unusually long, thick eyelashes that are unique to Tony. The way he’s stylized his facial hair- the only small bit of vanity he allows himself- is also distinctive to him. It’s a strange combination of characteristics that T’Challa is mostly unfamiliar with but they come together beautifully, like a living work of art.

Tony seems to feel T’Challa’s eyes on him because he turns, frowning a little. “What?” he asks, echoing his earlier question.

T’Challa shakes his head, “its nothing you need to worry about,” he tells Tony. He wouldn’t know how to word his appreciation anyways. Tony is beautiful in an entirely unique way, but his words will never encapsulate that beauty.

When T’Challa wakes it’s with a start and he glares into the darkness, irritated that his dream had been disrupted. It’d been pleasant and enlightening to see Tony there, right where he should be- with T’Challa. He lets out a long sigh, wondering how he’ll manage to convince Tony of that when he seems so disinterested. T’Challa doesn’t understand how one could be so dismissive of a blessing like that but he supposes Tony may have his own form of religion. There were several, it seems reasonable that some survived. But surely Tony’s religion would regard soul mates as a gift, right? Why wouldn’t it?

It occurs to him that perhaps other religions _didn’t_ survive and maybe that’s why Tony seemed disinterested. Because he has no faith and T’Challa simply can’t fathom that, he must have faith in _something_.

*

T’Challa’s body is strong, well muscled, and Tony can feel a bit of fat clinging to his torso in a way that indicates that he’s well fed. Its not a common body type in the city, Tony’s comes the closest and he does his best to avoid taking more than he needs. He already has too much with his own large space in the Tower along with all the furniture that comes with it. It’s so much more than most people have already.

He doesn’t think T’Challa’s people have the same problem though. They all have a good amount of body fat and the all seem sturdier than anyone here. If T’Challa notices Tony’s distinctly thinner frame though he doesn’t say anything about it and Tony is grateful for it. Instead he presses Tony to the stone wall behind him gently, but his kisses indicate a held back urgency that has Tony curious so he pulls him in closer, interested in what that will do.

It gets him pressed further into the wall, flush against it while T’Challa nips at his jaw line. Tony lets out an unexpected pleased noise and T’Challa laughs softly, obviously happy to have gotten this result. Tony is somewhat confused over his reaction because he’s never really reacted like this before, but he’s not exactly opposed to exploring it further. T’Challa presses kisses to his neck and Tony closes his eyes, letting out a soft sigh as he lets his head fall to the side, giving T’Challa more room. His grip on T’Challa’s waist tightens and T’Challa nuzzles the space just underneath his jaw.

“Is this okay?” he murmurs. His voice is deep, and the accent makes his English sound different, pleasant. Tony likes the combination.

“Yes,” he breathes out, shuddering lightly when T’Challa nips at his jaw again.

When he wakes it’s with a start and he frowns, disoriented as he tries to figure out what the hell just happened. Peter squints at him for a moment like he’s trying to figure something out before he wrinkles his nose, “oh my god, did I just wake you up from a sex dream?” he asks.

“No,” Tony says immediately. There wasn’t any sex so its not like his answer is a lie but Peter doesn’t buy it either.

“That’s gross, I did not need to be exposed to this,” he says, shaking his head. His eyes are wide with horror like it never occurred to him that Tony has a sex life. Damn kids, he doesn’t even know where they get their weird aversion to adults that are close to them having a sex life. That’s a pretty normal thing so its not like they have no exposure to the idea but they don’t seem to like it much. ‘Course that doesn’t seem to stop them from doing their own experiments with sex once they hit a certain age, which really only confuses Tony more. Kids. They’re a strange breed.

“Is there a purpose for you being in my room?” Tony asks, knowing there is. No one would send Peter here to wake him up if there wasn’t some kind of emergency. But Peter isn’t acting like the situation is urgent and if it was he doubts he’d care about Tony’s not-a-sex-dream. The kid is easily distracted but he’s not _that_ easily distracted.

His purpose for being here must click in for him though because something obviously occurs to him. “Right, yeah. That tablet thing, the one that lets you see what’s going on in the bunker, it keeps beeping. We don’t know what the hell is going on but Riri said someone managed to gain some kind of access to the systems? She said to get you.”

He swears and all but flies out of bed. T’Challa best not have lied to him because he will find that Tony is a rather formidable opponent when tested.


	5. Chapter 5

When Tony locates Riri she hands him the tablet wordlessly and Tony looks at it. Immediately he knows that it’s not T’Challa messing with the systems, or his sister. They’d had a brief interest in getting Tony out of the bunker, not gassing the people who were in it out. Whoever messed with the systems didn’t know what they were doing and now… well now he hopes that the effects aren’t too catastrophic. He quickly closes the fucking vents remotely- that’d been a bitch to figure out- and turns to Riri, “tell Natasha I had to go to the bunker. The fucking idiots managed to open the vents and it’s probably a good idea to assess the damage,” he says.

She nods and takes off to do that and he sighs. Well this is just fucking great- with any luck only the people that were a nuisance to him got killed off. He thinks of Rhodey for a moment and his heart squeezes painfully so he shakes his head. He has no time to worry about whether or not Rhodey is dead; he needs to get to the damn bunker.

*

Rhodey is the only one who isn’t surprised when the vents close, and he’s even less surprised when Tony shows up within the hour. He goes through the routine he always does even if he obviously rushes it and makes his way into the bunker. “What the fuck happened?” he asks immediately, concern high on his features. This situation is exactly why he’s so fucking annoyed with Steve’s actions. Tony holds a lot of power over them sure, but not once has he ever used it and now here he is looking to help.

“Why don’t you ask Steve,” he says, bitterness leaking into his tone as he turns and starts towards the controls room. Tony follows fast, catching up with him easily.

“I’m glad you’re not dead,” Tony says almost too low to hear and Rhodey smiles sadly.

“Me too,” he murmurs back.

When they get to the control room Tony immediately starts towards Steve, who looks as haunted as he fucking _should_. “What the hell did you do?” Tony snaps, using the same tone he might if he scolded a child. Steve spares him an irritated look that Tony doesn’t deserve because he’s done this to himself. Rhodey _told_ him it was too easy, that something was obviously wrong but no, Steve knows best and now people are dead.

“I tried to get you out,” Steve tells him, anger flashing across his features quickly before guilt replaces it.

Tony shakes his head, “and it didn’t occur to you that I wouldn’t make that easy? That the way I set things up would probably lead you in ten different directions before you found the right one? You’re not stupid, Steve, don’t act it,” Tony snaps. It’s such a weird reaction Rhodey thinks, Tony scolding Steve for not thinking things through like he’d actually want Steve to succeed in that. He’s not sure Steve could ever figure Tony’s set up out and Rhodey is gifted, but he’s not totally sure he’s _that_ gifted. With Wakanda gone Steve had decided to take matters into his own hands though and they’ve paid for that.

Bucky appears at the door, sticking his head in a little and Tony goes to him before Steve can even react. “How many are dead?” he murmurs in a low voice, slightly around the corner of the doorway.

“Thirty seven,” Bucky says softly. He looks as haunted as Steve and Tony sighs, rubbing his temples.

“If you can get them outside I’ll make sure they get buried,” he murmurs. Bucky nods and heads off to do that while Tony steps back in. “You’re a fucking _idiot_ ,” he tells Steve.

Steve gives Tony a dirty look; “all I wanted was to get you out of our damn systems. What the hell is it that you want from us anyways?” he snaps.

Tony rolls his eyes, “you’re technology Steve, have you not noticed that by now?” he asks.

“Then why don’t you just _ask_ instead of holding us hostage?” Steve asks.

Confusion crosses Tony’s features, “why would you just give me things? Nothing in this world comes without a price,” he says.

“What’s the price of you burying our dead?” Rhodey asks, interrupting Tony and Steve’s arguing. He knows the answer but he wants Tony to say it because it will make Steve’s offer less difficult to believe. For all his flaws, of which there are many, generosity is not something Steve is lacking in. Its not something Tony lacks either, which is why Steve’s actions irritate Rhodey and why Tony’s reaction to Steve makes no sense to him.

“Nothing, they have to go somewhere and that’s a lot of bodies. I don’t know what you do with your dead but something tells me you aren’t prepared for that many bodies all at once,” Tony says like this is the most logical, reasonable thing in the world.

Its not because Schmidt wouldn’t ever just _do_ something nice like that- he’s always looking for something to make his life easier, better. Unless someone outsmarts him and backs him into a corner like both Steve and Tony have done he’ll use whomever however he deems acceptable to get what he wants. If that doesn’t work then he bargains his way into cooperation from his threat to hold off on potential carnage. Granted it didn’t work so well with Steve, everyone likes him better in charge and Schmidt had no desire to deal with a mob so he backed down softly even if he’s certainly plotting revenge.

“We cremate the dead, but we’ve never had this many die at once. I don’t know what we’d do, but you offered to us a favor free of price by your own admission so why is it so hard to think that _maybe_ Steve would help you if you asked?” He can see Tony deny, at least to himself, that it’s the same situation but he doesn’t say it out loud at first.

“Technology is in limited supply, it makes no sense to just hand it out. That’s a strategically bad choice,” Tony points out.

“So is killing thirty seven people accidentally trying to ensure we have control over our own resources,” Steve tells him. “You’ve won and you didn’t even need to be here to fight the fucking war.”

“You’re also the only reason those vents closed,” Rhodey says mostly for Steve’s benefit. He hadn’t understood why they closed again, which really only does so much for damage control, but Rhodey had recognized the way the systems reacted. “That’s another nice thing with no real expectations attached to it. I mean you could have let us gas ourselves out like a bunch of morons messing with stuff we don’t understand,” Rhodey points out.

But he didn’t because that’s not who Tony is. Steve might see him as this big bad person holding their lives on a string but the truth is that Tony has had the power to take everything he wants from them from almost the beginning. If he were what Steve thinks he is none of them would be around to be pissed off about it. Someone who’s power hungry and intent on just taking what they want wouldn’t just sit on a bunker of resources they’d conquer and take over. But Tony didn’t do that- he made efforts to make trades, checked in on them, made sure they were safe even if he controlled their systems and sometimes reminded them of it. To anyone with a half a brain though it’s obvious that Tony has never had plans to hurt or kill them. Not when he’s gone so far out of his way to avoid doing just that.

Steve frowns, “you were the one that closed the vents?” he asks and Tony clenches his jaw, nodding. He’s only pissed off because he knows Rhodey is right and has no argument against it. It happens somewhat frequently with them. Steve sighs after a few more moments of silence, “technology might be limited but so is our population. I’ll take my people over the computers, Tony. Take what you want, just leave us alone.”

Rhodey rolls his eyes, “he didn’t even do anything to us,” he points out. “Last I checked it was _you_ who killed a bunch of people.” It’s harsh, but he feels it’s deserved. So Steve wants to lead- fine. But Rhodey is tired of leaders refusing to see what’s in front of their faces- Tony might hold a technical control but he’s shown an active disinterest in using that power. He’s not the threat he’s been made out to be and they should focus on making a connection to him, not alienating him.

Stephen has been wondering for _years_ how Tony and his people managed to adapt to the air outside and if they stop trying to push Tony out they just might get some answers. Rhodey knows Tony holds a natural curiosity, he’s seen Tony work with tech. If he thinks he’ll learn something he’ll be inclined to help them out. And if they can figure out how Tony adapted maybe they can manage to do so themselves and get the hell out of this bunker. Or at least learn to mitigate the effects or something.

Steve lets out a harsh noise, “whatever, just take the damn tech and get out of our systems,” he tells Tony, ignoring Rhodey.

Tony frowns, trying to figure out the straightforward information in a way that irritates Rhodey. So he can hand things out with no expectations but he can’t accept the same behavior returned? “You’re just… giving me things?” he asks, not quite sure how to handle that.

“Yeah-” Steve starts but Rhodey cuts him off, finding the solution to their problem quickly.

“Actually we want some of your blood. We don’t know how or why you adapted to the new environment and we’re curious to see if you have different genetic markers or… I don’t know, I’m not a doctor but it would be nice to get some cooperation. And other blood samples,” he adds. Boom- now there’s still a trade, a catch that Tony can feel comfortable enough with that he takes the damn tech and maybe he’ll give them their systems back.

“You should let Rhodey take charge. He’s better at it than you,” Tony tells Steve.

*

Natasha shakes her head, “absolutely fucking not,” she says.

Tony sighs, “we have to give her a chance some time,” he points out. “And I actually do need the help.”

“And if she kills you and plants you with the rest of the bodies?” Nat asks.

“That’s why you’re coming with us,” he tells her. “It’s more difficult to kill two people at once and also there are thirty nine bodies so the more the merrier, really.” He wonders if anyone else has died from their radiation burns in the meantime but he has no idea. They were lucky that only two died from the burns after they were brought to the hospital section of the bunker anyways. Rhodey had taken an easy control there too, distributing resources easily in a way that tells Tony that he should be the one leading, not Steve. He thinks Steve is ballsy and that has its use, but it doesn’t make for a good leader when it’s combined with an obvious impulsive nature. He knows that better than most.

“Thirty nine?” she shakes her head. “What was the point of that?”

“To get me out of their systems,” he says, not that that worked. Those people all died in vain and Steve knows it, feels guilty because of it just like he should.

“He killed thirty nine people to get you out of his systems? Was that supposed to _motivate_ you?” she asks. “You should have let them gas themselves out, we could have just moved to the damn bunker,” she mumbles. He could have done that sure, but then he would have had to live with it too.

Obviously they didn’t succeed in getting him out of the bunker but he understands Natasha’s confusion over their actions regardless. “He was looking for a way to kick me out and accidentally unlocked the vents. Rhodey told him he was making too much progress in too little time- that it was clearly a trap and it was. JARVIS was set up to purposefully mislead anyone who tried to remove me from the systems. Guess he has thirty nine reminders of his failures now.” Rhodey had been harsh too, and called Steve on his stupidity. And then, interestingly, he set up a trade.

His blood isn’t a bad trade for tech. Frankly it’s a steal and he’s happy to take it for that price. Besides that he’s curious about how he and the others managed to live too. No one seemed to be adapted to the air pre-planet going to shit so how come they are now? Something obviously changed because Rhodey’s group of people hasn’t been outside that bunker since before everything went tits up. He also wonders if they can find a way for Rhodey’s group to adapt to the environment somehow. He’s sure that doctor of his, Stephen, will come up with something.

Natasha sighs, “that’s unfortunate. Why did you offer to bury them, though, it’s a needless amount of work for us.”

Her stance reminds him of Rhodey and the way he pointed out that Tony does things for them without expecting stuff in return. “I didn’t want to leave them with a bunch of dead bodies, Nat. They only have so much space,” he points out.

“That’s not your problem,” she says, further reminding him of Rhodey.

He sighs, “well I already agreed and I figured this was a good opportunity to give Nebula something useful to do. We can always use the extra help.” This seemed like a good place to start- a task away from the others in case things actually _do_ go wrong.

“You could have given her a task that’s actually useful to us,” Natasha mumbles.

“And have you whine when she poisons the food? Please. Digging holes is less potentially troublesome to us,” he says. And he already agreed so he’d like the help before the bodies got particularly disgusting. They probably shouldn’t have been left this long, honestly.

“Next time leave someone else to deal with the dead bodies. You know how much I enjoy grave digging,” Natasha tells him.

Yeah, alright, but its not like anyone _enjoys_ that job so she’s not special there.

*

Shuri is tired of T’Challa’s moping- its pathetic to watch. “We need to make him do something,” Shuri says to Okoye. If he’ll listen to anyone it’ll be his trusted general, not his sibling that he finds more irritating than not.

Okoye shakes her head. “This is for the best, Shuri. We don’t need this mess,” she tells her.

Need this mess? This is the first time Wakanda has seen a soul bond in almost two centuries and _no one_ wants to explore that? If Tony were Wakandan this would not be an issue. “Okoye, T’Challa has been pouting for the last week. He is distracted and if it doesn’t affect his work now it will. If nothing else he needs closure,” she says. She doesn’t want that, she wants to see her brother play out whatever kind of match this soul bond is but if Tony chooses not to further is there’s little anyone can do about that.

“Shuri, Tony made his choice explicitly clear. What do you expect T’Challa to do about that?” she asks.

She rolls her eyes. “Figure out _why_ that is. Maybe soul bonds are common with these people, we can learn about them. Maybe they don’t believe in soul bonds at all and we can teach them. Maybe they don’t care about them at all. Maybe Tony has a personal reason for not wanting a bond, I don’t know, the possibilities are endless. We should try to learn,” she says. “That and maybe if T’Challa gets what he would consider a real answer he will stop moping on the throne, its embarrassing to watch,” she says. He sits around in it all day looking like a dejected teen, which she finds offensive because _she_ is supposed to be the only dejected teen around here, thanks.

Okoye considers her for a long moment before shaking her head. “There’s no reason to learn about these people, Shuri. You are blinded by your own curiosity and using T’Challa’s bond as an excuse to stick your nose where it doesn’t belong.” She says it gently, like she’s offering advice and Shuri thinks that’s what makes her even angrier. Yes, she’s curious, of _course_ she is! Why is no one but her interested in actually following through with her father’s interest in the outside world? Why are they all so content to let Wakanda be all there is?

For a long moment she stands there, simmering with anger before she shakes her head and walks away. Okoye calls after her but she ignores it. Fine- if no one else wants to explore these people than _she_ will find a way to do so herself.

She makes sure to avoid T’Challa and the other Dora Milaje while she makes her way to the planes. They leave and come back all the time; no one will suspect anything if another takes off with her in it. Even if they do, by chance, happen to catch her she has built almost everything in this country technologically- they won’t be able to stop her using her own systems.

As expected though no one suspects her plane as it leaves, so she puts it in autopilot and grabs that tablet she swiped from the bunker, the one that’s attached to its systems. She frowns when he notices an entire area has been opened and then sealed, but it doesn’t take long to determine that it had been opened from the inside and sealed remotely. That suggests someone else tried to kill people _in_ the bunker and Tony saved them. She could be wrong, but logically only Tony spends time outside the bunker. It makes the most sense for him to have been the one who turned the systems off.

With that figured out she decides to send Tony a message she’s sure he’s smart enough to receive. Its as much a test of his intelligence as it is a test of his technology and she thinks it will be useful. Plus she needs to make contact somehow and this seems like a good way to do it. She’s dozing in her seat when a small ‘ping!’ alerts her to Tony’s response so she shakes off her sleep and reads the message.

_Get lost_

She clenches her jaw, irritated that _this_ is the response because isn’t he curious too? She asks that because there’s no way she’s the only one who feels this way. Why is everyone so content to steep in only their understandings of the world? It’s limiting, living like that. Whoever these people are they have a whole new way of life- new ways of communicating, organizing, building things- she wants to know how they do it. Don’t they also wonder about Wakanda?

_Curiosity isn’t worth the risk_

Tony’s response makes her tilt her head to the side and frown.

 _Learning is always worth the price we pay for that knowledge_ is what she sends back. Pure curiosity, the kind that is motivated by a sheer wonder at the hidden knowledge at the world, is always worth looking into.

**Author's Note:**

> [My writing Tumblr](https://tenspencerriedplease.tumblr.com/)


End file.
